Of Bets and Ginny Weasley
by marina eys
Summary: We all know of those stories where the guy makes a bet that he can get the girl, but then falls in love with her only she finds out. Well that’s what happened to Malfoy with Ginny. And now she wants nothing more to do with him. Except maybe kill him. DG


**Of Bets and Ginny Weasley**

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**Disclaimer: **I own nothing, zilch, nada – it all belongs to J.K Rowling and Warner Brothers. Okay?

**Author's Note: **This is just a small one-shot that I wrote up when I was bored. It takes place after Ginny has just found that Malfoy had made a bet to get close to her. It takes place in Ginny's sixth and Malfoy's seventh year at Hogwarts. It's obviously Draco/Ginny. Please read and review, I don't think you'll regret it.

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It was late at night and Ginny Weasley had just fallen asleep in front of the fireplace when a small noise woke her up. Draco Malfoy appeared before her, having emerged from an Invisibility Cloak. 

She stood up abruptly and turned away, her back uncaringly facing him in the dimly lit Gryffindor common room.

"What do you want?" she stated coldly, insultingly impersonal.

"You." He replied bluntly yet his tone was so very different from the distant response of the striking redhead before him.

"No, you don't. You've already made _that_ perfectly clear." She spoke snidely, a small amount of hurt creeping into her voice. But the blond Slytherin behind her was not disheartened. In fact, he actually felt comforted – if she still felt hurt then she still felt something towards him, didn't she?

"Look, I know I _was_ lying to you-"

"Really? I never would have guessed." She spoke sarcastically whipping around, her chocolate brown eyes blazing.

Malfoy swallowed nervously. _Merlin, she was always most beautiful when she was angry. _

"Just let me finish speaking." He looked at her desperately, and she reluctantly nodded, signalling for him to go on. He took a deep breath. _Why was she the only woman who could ever unnerve him? _"When I did first err, pursue you, it was part of a bet that I'd made with Blaise."

Ginny snorted. "No shit, Sherlock." Draco looked at her bizarrely. "It's a muggle expression I picked up from Harry." She explained, satisfied when she saw a flash of irritation pass through his eyes at the mention of his archenemy.

He shook his head, clearing his mind of all thoughts. _Ginny, just focus on Ginny. _He told himself. "And when I did first tell you…" he trailed off, unsure of how to continue on.

"Tell me all those lies about how you secretly liked me but could never admit to it because of your father, I think you mean those lies." She finished for him, hands crossed over her chest.

"Yes those lies, I was a different person. I really didn't know you then-"

"Bullshit, Malfoy! And you know it." She lowered her eyes.

Draco winced. So it was back to Malfoy was it? He had thought that she had gotten out of the habit of referring to him by his last name, but obviously he was wrong.

"No, it's not." He spoke so quietly and determinedly that Ginny could not help but jerk her head upwards from where she had been staring at the floor to look at him, to try and understand him. "The more I got to know you, the less I started to dislike you and that dislike soon turned into like and then that like became something more."

He could see Ginny turn around again, unwilling to face him.

"I'm not lying. When I told you how I cared about you at the Christmas Ball, I meant it. It wasn't something that I made up. But I couldn't tell you about the bet even then, I knew that you would be furious and I also felt a little, well, ashamed." His voice grew louder as he started to gain more confidence.

"So you let Pansy tell me the truth instead?" she cried out accusingly.

"She was just jealous. I never meant for you to find out about it that way. I didn't want to lose you. _Ever._"

He could see her shoulders start to slightly shake. _Was she crying? Curse that bet!_ He thought, but then again if he hadn't then he would never have gotten to know Ginny the way he had.

He closed his eyes momentarily, trying to gather up enough courage and to get over his pride so that he could say the hardest part, the part that he had never said to her, or to anybody in his life before, not even platonically to his parents. Before she had found out about the bet, she had said to him those three words seven times to him in total – each time he had counted, cursing himself for having lied to her in the first place and feeling too guilty to return the favour. And if she rejected what he had to say to her, he had no idea how he was going to be able to cope.

"Because despite everything, despite all our differences and despite our families and all our friends, I came to love you Ginevra Molly Weasley – and I still do."

The shaking became more obvious and he came up from behind her, wrapping his arms around her small waist and turning her around so that they faced each other.

He wiped off a few tears that had fallen down her face, his slightly tanned skin a contrast to her pale alabaster one. She still kept her eyes cast downward.

"Ginny, look at me." He whispered, tilting her chin up. She reluctantly raised her eyes. "You're so beautiful." And before she could so much as think about protesting, he closed the narrow distance between their lips and pressed his tightly against hers. He kissed her passionately, breathing in her light intoxicating perfume and moving his tongue softly against her own, but eventually stopped when he realised that she wasn't kissing him back.

He opened his eyes, not even realising that he had closed them until that moment, and smiled sadly, the smile not even reaching his eyes.

"I guess it was worth a try." He shrugged forlornly, not trying to show how rejected he felt, or show that he would love nothing more in that moment than to drown himself in the Slytherin bathroom or to forget how his Malfoy pride that he had once depended upon for survival had just been shot to bits.

He took one last look at her tear stained face, her bright red-kissed lips and her lovely wide-open eyes. "I guess it was worth a try." He slowly began to walk away." _Merlin,_ he wanted to die. He felt like his whole world was crashing down around him but the surprising thing was that he didn't care. All he wanted was Ginny.

But Ginny wouldn't have him.

And so he had just exited the Gryffindor common room, very much aware for the first time of the small audience that had formed around them inside (no doubt they had all been woken up from the commotion), when he heard a girl call out from behind him, "Draco."

He whirled around. _Ginny._ "It's okay, Gin. I mean it's not. I'll probably try to drown myself in the Slytherin bathroom after this, and I don't think I'll ever forget yo-, but you don't want to hear about that of course. I understand, I'll just be going, I won't bother you again. You've made that perfectly clear-" he spoke rapidly, unaware of the huge grin that had appeared on the petite Gryffindor's face.

"You do realise that you're rambling, don't you?" she raised one arched eyebrow at him in amusement.

"Rambling? Me? Malfoys don't ramble. But I'm sorry I'll just get going. Don't want to humiliate myself any more than I already have. I'll just step out of your way, after Graduation you won't even have to see me again." He continued on rapidly, his eyes flickering about on anything but the girl gazing up at him.

"Malfoy?" Ginny managed to say when Draco had stopped talking for a moment to take a breath.

"Yes?" Draco studied her intensely, a small flicker of hope welling up inside of him at the sight of the sly smile on Ginny's face.

"Shut up."

"Oh." He looked down at the floor, so that some of his blond hair hid his face. He was trying to hold in what he desperately felt like doing and turned away abruptly when he felt a tear being to slide down his handsome face. Somewhere in the back of his mind he could hear his father yelling at him scornfully, _Malfoy men should _never_ cry._

But he wasn't able to take a single step when he felt something tug his cloak and saw that it was Ginny.

"You're such an idiot." She breathed.

_Great, another insult. I already know I'm worthless. _Were the thoughts running through Malfoy's head when suddenly his brain stopped working because Ginny Weasley was doing something that he never thought she would do again. She was kissing him, and with as much fervour as he had done just minutes before. For a second he froze in shock, his mind trying to register whether what was happening was actually _real_ and not just some illusion. But when he started kissing her back and heard her moan, he knew that it was all too real.

They stood there for ages, just kissing, holding and sometimes whispering to each other. Eventually they broke apart when they saw Ronald Weasley standing in the Gryffindor common room doorway, the rest of the members of his house behind him.

Malfoy was prepared for the male Weasley to strike out at him and start some kind of fight. What he was not prepared for was Weasley uttering gruffly, "Why don't you two get a room?" before he slammed the door shut in front of them.

Ginny must have sensed Draco's surprise because she murmured to him. "He's been complaining about my moping for weeks ever since we split. Secretly you're his blessing in disguise now that you've got me off his back."

Malfoy smirked, as was his trademark. "Miss me much?" he spoke cockily, not as if he had simply just poured his heart out to her moments before.

"Draco, I swear that you are so _up_ yourself sometimes!" she rolled her eyes, knowing that it was all an act.

"I know, but you love me for it." He replied smugly before pulling her into another heart stopping kiss.

And he couldn't think of anything that he'd rather be doing, _ever.

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**A/N: **Pretty please review! 


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